Thursday, October 21, 2010

A Post of Changes

We had a great Fall Art Tour. We had wonderful, interesting customers, and got a chance to catch up with many folks who visited us last year. As functional potters, we think it's a high compliment to have someone take home and enjoy our work and come back for more! My dad, Ray Hamilton, was our guest artist, and his wood-turning demonstrations were a highlight of the tour for many of our customers. His finished bowls and vases looked beautiful in the afternoon sun, as well:

Now that the pottery will be slowing down for us over the winter, we have time to focus on other things. I'll let Joe tell you about his next venture first:

Hey, y'all, I'm off to North Carolina for the next month or so... I was scheduled to leave town about four hours ago so I'm going to keep this fairly short. I'm headed down to help our good friend/potter/blogger Julie Jones build her kiln outside of Durham. I'm planning on being there somewhere around four weeks, most of which I imagine I'll have to have my nose to the grindstone. However I certainly hope to take a little time to visit some friends while I'm there.

Julie and I have been discussing this for some time and mulling over kiln options. Here are the plans as I have them drawn now:

Two chambers, one for reduction, one for salt. The first main firebox is stoked from the front. There is also a small secondary firebox between the two chambers. This will make life easier and more efficient if Julie ever wants to just fire the salt chamber. The kiln has fairly large flues for it's size, with a decent size firebox-- Julie would like to fire it in one day (12-14 hours) so keeping those proportions is important. What else to say... oh... we dropped the smoke duct/round chimney in favor of a simpler square chimney coming off of the back of the second chamber....

That's all I've got for now, I'm looking forward to starting construction. We'll keep you all updated either though this blog or on Julies, or both.

Joe

Sounds like fun, doesn't it? I'm a little jealous that Joe gets to spend so much time with our NC friends, but I'm hoping to make it down for a few days myself...since I am FINISHED with my day job in two weeks! I have decided to go back to school for cosmetology. My good friend Kristy Church planted the seed in my head long ago, and I have finally decided to go for it as an enjoyable, creative supplement to our pottery income.

I know my choice is probably shocking to those of you who always imagined my next degree would involve a Ph and a close reading of some obscure, highly interpretable novel, but after lots of waffling, I'm feeling good about my choice. Rest assured, though, friends, I will always be there for you if you want to dork-out over Jane Austin, Eyre, or Hamilton. And I get to take two weeks off between the end of my unfortunate day job and the start of classes to work in the studio and (hopefully) get to NC.

m--I know Joe is planning a short jaunt to Seagrove at some point, but I don't think it will be while the show is up. Will you send our pots home with Jeff and Steph? I haven't asked them yet, but I'm sure they won't mind hanging on to them for a few weeks.**c